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India’s Prime Minister Narendra Modi will today inaugurate the world’s largest statue, the Statue of Unity in Gujarat. At 182m tall (240m including the base), it is twice the height of the Statue of Liberty, and depicts India’s first deputy Prime Minister, Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel.

The Statue of Unity is part of a broader push by Modi’s Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) to promote Patel as a symbol of Indian nationalism and free-market development. The statue’s website praises him for bringing the princely states into the Union of India and for being an early advocate of Indian free enterprise.

The BJP’s promotion of Patel also serves to overshadow the legacy of his boss, India’s first prime minister, Jawaharlal Nehru. Nehru’s descendants head India’s most influential opposition party, the Indian National Congress.

The statue was supposed to be built with both private and public money, but it attracted little private investment. In the end, the government of Gujarat paid for much of the statue’s US$416.67 million price tag.

The structure itself is not exactly a model of sustainable design. Some 5,000 tonnes of iron, 75,000 cubic metres of concrete, 5,700 tonnes of steel, and 22,500 tonnes of bronze sheets were used in its construction.

Critics of the statue note that this emblem of Indian nationalism was built partly with Chinese labour and design, with the bronze sheeting subcontracted to a Chinese firm.

The statue’s position next to the controversial Sardar Sarovar Dam is also telling. While chief minister of Gujarat from 2001 to 2014, Modi pushed for the dam’s construction despite the World Bank’s condemnation. He praised the dam’s completion in 2017 as a monument to India’s progress.

Both the completion of the dam and the statue that celebrates it suggest that the BJP government is backing economic development over human rights and environmental protections.

Both the statue and its setting are examples of unsustainable development.Divyakant Solanki/AAP Image

Despite this record, the United Nations’ Environmental Programme (UNEP) recently awarded Modi its highest environmental award. It made him a Champion of the Earth for his work on solar energy development and plastic reduction.

Visitors to the statue will access it via a 5km boat ride. At the statue’s base, they can buy souvenirs and fast food, before taking a high-speed elevator to the observation deck.

The observation deck will be situated in Patel’s head. From it, tourists will look out over the Sardar Sarovar Dam, as the accompanying commentary praises “united” India’s national development successes.

But let’s not forget the environmental and minority protections that have been sacrificed to achieve these goals.

This article was amended on November 7, 2018, to clarify the role of Chinese companies in the statue’s design and construction.